


City Lights They're Turning

by hopelessbookgeek



Series: Gold-Lie Promises [3]
Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Police Brutality, Prison
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-18
Updated: 2016-11-18
Packaged: 2018-08-31 15:53:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8584486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hopelessbookgeek/pseuds/hopelessbookgeek
Summary: Ray's always tried to do his best, but when he gets on a cop's bad side, he realizes that justice and vengeance have a lot more in common than he'd always thought...





	

**Author's Note:**

> RAY IS A GOOD BOY

“Five… four… three… two… one! Yes! Happy end of fucking shift!” Ray tossed his hat in the air like a graduation cap. “I’m so out of here.”

“Brag about it,” Tina muttered, but she smiled. The night manager had a bit of a soft spot for the loudmouth Ray, but not enough to let him clock out before eleven. “You’re in tomorrow, right?”

“Yeah, but I’m out at six, so I’ll just miss you. And you’ll be missing me!”

“No I won’t, and get out before I fire your ass.” She smiled again, though. “Have a good night, Ray. See you…?”

“Saturday, probably. I’m gonna go crash. Peace out, losers.” He picked his hat up from the dusty floor and stuffed it in his sweatshirt pocket. From the other pocket he pulled out his iPod and headphones and got his music going to prepare him for the walk home.

No matter how many times he took the walk home, it wasn’t any better. He’d taken a cab a few times and gotten mugged in almost every one, which wasn’t worth it; Michael was usually out at work or something by this time at night and wasn’t able to give him a ride; the Los Santos subway system sucked complete ass and would drop him off way too far from his apartment to bother with. Walking it was, then.

It was a little more obnoxious at this time of year, too. It was mid-autumn and so during the days, when he walked to work, it was hot and the blaring sunlight bit at his ears and neck, but now, in the late hours of the night, it was almost too cold for just the sweatshirt. He shivered, pulled the hood up, and set off.

The safer path would be along the well-lit streets, but that was almost twice as long as the straight shot through the park, and so Ray went through the park, because he was cold and lazy and tired. And what was going to happen? Was he gonna get mugged for the money he didn’t have? Stabbed? Whatever.

And actually, the park was lovely. Someone, probably someone who knew how many prostitutes gathered there, paid for it to be kept up to a reasonable degree, so it was pretty landscaped. The leaves on the trees were deep burnished copper and the moonlight filtered through them carefully, delicately. This was probably the only place in the city limits where the stars shone through the smog and light pollution, and Ray stopped with his face upturned to look at them. A smile spread across his face for half a heartbeat.

In the next moment, he felt himself yanked backwards by his sweatshirt. One of his earbuds fell out as he stumbled. “Hey! What the hell?”

“What are you doing out here at this hour?” It was a cop. Ray relaxed.

“Just walking home from work. I live just down…” He pointed the way he’d been walking. He was close enough to his street that he could see the disco lights from the apartment next to his.

“You aren’t supposed to be out here this late. Park closes at ten. Signs all over the place.”

Ray furrowed his brow. “I’ve, uh, never seen any signs… Sorry, man, I didn’t–”

“Don’t call me ‘man’. You treat me with respect, boy. ID?”

“I… I don’t have it. I don’t carry my wallet with me to work…”

The cop narrowed his eyes and put a hand to the holster on his hip, and Ray felt more afraid in the city of his birth than he ever had before. “You’re not making this easy, are you?”

“I’m not doing it on purpose! I didn’t see the signs, I didn’t bring my wallet, it was a mistake! I’ll go home and won’t come this way after ten anymore!”

Wrong answer. Or wrong tone, or wrong person, or wrong place, or wrong moment, because the cop pulled out his gun and smacked Ray across the face with it so hard it brought tears to his eyes.

That was more than enough for him, and he turned and ran towards home, towards the god-awful disco lights in the distance like the tunnel to Heaven. He heard the cop shouting and didn’t take two more steps before he felt something get him in the back and electricity jolted through him, singeing his veins and tightening all his muscles so fast it knocked the air out of his lungs. He fell to his knees trembling and his empty eyes turned upwards. “Where’d all the stars go?” he gasped, and then the world went black.

***

Ray would be thankful, later, that he wasn’t awake when the Taser’s barbs were pulled from the skin of his back, although the wounds they left would hurt for a week and leave scars. He didn’t wake up until the cop car pulled up outside the station, and he was still groggy when the cop pulled him inside, read him his rights, and threw him in a cell with some big muscular guy covered in tattoos. He sat on the bunk and slumped against the wall, wincing as the concrete brushed his injured back.

“Taser?” Muscles suggested, cocking his head a little like it was a fun little mystery. “Musta got you good, kid, you look like shit. What’d they get you on? Jaywalkin’? Smokin’ weed?”

“Trespassing and civil disobedience,” Ray mumbled. His hand spasmed, the aftereffects of the electricity.

“Ooh, nice. Just for the night, I’m guessin’.”

“Til someone posts bail.” Two thousand, they’d said. When he got his one phone call, he hoped Michael would pick up. He’d be covering rent for a while to make up for this one. Muscles didn’t say anything and eventually a kind-looking sheriff with a red ponytail let him call Michael, who thankfully picked up and promised he was on his way– but he was about an hour away. Ray, trying not to cry, shuffled back to his cell.

“Did they really beat the shit outta you for trespassin’?” Muscles asked before Ray could even sit back down.

“Yeah. I was walking home through the park, I didn’t realize it closed at ten… The cop kept saying there were signs everywhere but I grew up here and I’ve never seen them.”

“Mm. Bet you told him that, and I bet he got real mad, didn’t he?”

Ray nodded and touched the bruised corner of his jaw. It was red and tender now, and by tomorrow it would be swollen and purple and he wouldn’t be able to chew correctly for four days. “I never even got detention in school,” he admitted. “I always tried to be good.”

“Ain’t no use bein’ good when someone else is hell bent on bein’ bad,” Muscles said, and in this absurd situation that almost sounded like poetry. “Some cops are just dirty like that, kid. Not your fault.”

“What if I didn’t have bail? What if my roommate didn’t pick up? Would I be stuck here until someone came looking for me?”

“Could be.” Muscles looked him over and Ray pulled his knees to his chest. “You look like you’d be good in a fight, kid. Wily, you know? Fast.”

“Not fast enough,” he muttered. “Never been in a fight. Wouldn’t know.”

Muscles shrugged. “First time for everything. Let me tell you somethin’, kid. When someone is hell bent on bein’ bad, you gotta play by their rules. You keep bein’ good at them, they’re gonna know they can step on you. You get me?”

“I got you.” The fear and anger welled up in his chest, bitter, like liquor that burns worse coming up than it did going down. His hand was still shaking and his back hurt and his jaw ached and he was stuck in some shitty, freezing cell with some guy whose name and crimes he didn’t know, and all he wanted to do was scream. “It’s not fair. It’s not fair!”

“It never is, kid.” Muscles started flipping through a magazine and let Ray think, and the more he thought, the more powerless he felt. He’d grown up in the city. He knew it was a dangerous place to be, but his father had been a cop and he’d always trusted them; they were supposed to be keeping the dangers at bay. Who was going to protect him when the first line of defense turned inward? He’d called the cops on Michael before for getting too rowdy with his gun on the balcony; had he risked the wrong cop showing up and gutting Michael before he could ask any questions? How could he have _not known? ___

__Michael showed up in forty-seven minutes and posted bail, and the red-headed sheriff came to bring Ray back out to him. “Thanks for the advice,” he said to Muscles on his way out._ _

__Muscles jumped up and handed him a scrap of paper. On it was scribbled the letter V and a phone number. “If you ever wanna make the world a little bit better,” he told Ray in a low voice, so the sheriff couldn’t hear, “you call that number.”_ _

__“Uh, thanks.” Ray stuck the paper in his pocket. “Hey, uh… what’re you in for?”_ _

__Muscles settled back on his bunk and grinned a wide toothy smiles. “Killed my cheatin’ whore of a wife.”_ _

__The hairs on the back of Ray’s neck stood up and he hurried away without looking back. Michael ushered him out to the car with only a cursory look at the sheriff and didn’t speak until they were racing back to their apartment. “Ray, what the fuck _happened?_ You’re the last person I would’ve thought would get arrested.”_ _

__Ray rested his head against the window and watched the world go by. “I’ll explain tomorrow. I’m so damn tired, Michael.”_ _

__“Okay, okay, I understand. It’s alright. Just… don’t fuckin’ scare me like that again, alright?”_ _

__He didn’t answer, but he looked down at his shaking hand and clenched it into a fist. _Never again_ , he thought, the phone number burning a hole in his pocket. _Never again_._ _

**Author's Note:**

> Heyo, spot the Lindsay


End file.
